Cooking with Linux - The Virtual Streets of $HOME

If you find yourself missing the lightcycles, check out Marcel's “Battles
Inside the Computer” on our Web site at /article/6638.

BZFlag is a multiplayer 3-D tank battle game you can play with others
across the Internet (Tim Riker is the current maintainer of
BZFlag, but
the original author is Chris Schoeneman). The name,
BZFlag, actually
stands for Battle Zone capture Flag. It is, in
essence, a capture-the-flag game. To get in on the action, look no further
than your distribution's CDs for starters. BZFlag's popularity means it
is often included with distros. Should you want to run the latest and
greatest version, however, visit the BZFlag site
(see Resources). You'll
find binaries, source and even packages for other operating systems. That
way, you can get everyone in on the action.

Unless you specify otherwise, BZFlag starts in
full-screen mode, but
you can override this by starting the program with the -window
option. The game begins at the Join Game screen. Before finding a server
(the first option on the screen), you may want to change your Callsign (or
nickname). We'll look at some of these other options after we've selected
a server. For now, move your cursor to the Find Server label and press Enter.

You won't have any trouble finding people to play with—you'll get
a list of dozens of servers currently hosting games (Figure 2). Scroll
down the list of names to find one that suits you. Your criteria might
be the number of players, how busy a server is or how many teams are
involved. When you look at the server list, make sure you pay attention
to the type of game being hosted on the server. Some have team-oriented
capture-the-flag play, and others host free-style action. You
also may be limited by the number of shots at your disposal, so aim carefully.

Figure 2. At any given time, dozens of BZFlag
servers are running worldwide and hundreds of people are playing.

When you have made your choice, press Enter, and you'll find yourself
back at the Join screen (Figure 3) with a server selected. You could
simply start the game, but you
may want to fine-tune a few more things before you start up your tank. Cursor down to
the Team label, and press your left or right arrow keys. By default, you
will be assigned to a team automatically, but you can change that here
if you prefer. One of the roles you can play instead of joining a team
is that of Observer. This is not a bad idea if you are new to the game,
because it lets you watch how others are handling themselves.

Figure 3. The Join screen lets you define your callsign as well as your
team.

The Join screen also lets you enter the name of a server manually,
rather than search for it. This is useful for hosting private games on
a local LAN. Speaking of hosting games, I'm sure you noticed the Start
Server option at the bottom of that list. Let's go ahead and join the
game. Scroll back up to Connect and press Enter.

I hope you are ready, mes amis, because the action starts
immediately, and some of these players are, well,
seasoned. Move
your tank using your mouse, and fire by clicking with the left-mouse
button. These tanks are highly maneuverable and
even can jump in
some games (you do this by pressing the Tab key). To learn all
the
keystrokes, by the way, press Esc at any time, and select Help. During play,
BZFlag provides an extensive heads-up display with stats on players,
kills, personal scores, team scores and more (Figure 4). Keep an eye
on the map to your lower left, as it can alert you to enemy tanks. If
you can drive, fire and type at the same time, press N to send a chat
message to the group, or M to send one only to your teammates. If you see the boss
coming, press F12 to exit the game in a hurry. Just a little joke,
mes amis. I would never suggest that you play this at work.

Figure 4. The action is fast and tense, with tanks blowing up everywhere you turn. Be careful not to be one of them.

The hour is getting late, mes amis, but I don't want to leave
you with the impression that all the virtual worlds that may exist in
our systems are built entirely on destruction and mayhem. You can,
in fact, build an entire civilization, including a city, its farms,
factories, markets and every other trapping of modern (or premodern)
civilization. Download Lincity (or check your distribution CDs)
and start building. The idea of this highly addictive and time-consuming
game is for you to build a city, and in the process, feed and clothe your
people, and create jobs so you can build and sustain an economy. Invest in
renewable energy as you strive to build a civic Utopia (Figure 5).

Figure 5. Lincity is a computerized city simulation that makes you wonder why creating a Utopia is so darn difficult.

As things get better and better, you can save your game and get back to
creating this ideal world of yours. Okay, you're right, it's not as easy
at it sounds. The clock is ticking, and the months go by fast. Without
careful attention, your world may wither away in its own poisons. I
should warn you that starting from scratch may be a bit of a confidence
destroyer. Why not start when things are good? When the game begins, click
the Menu button in the upper left. The main window then provides you
with some choices, including one to Load a saved game. The game comes with
two: one is called Good Times and the other (you guessed it), Bad Times. I
recommend Good Times to get your virtual flippers wet. When you get so
good at this that you feel you can fix anything, go for the Bad Times,
and see if you can pull your city back from being $25 million in debt.

The clock, mes amis, it is telling us that closing time is upon
us. With all these sounds of artillery and explosions coming from your
workstations, it seems obvious that we will have to stay open just a
little longer. François will happily refill your glasses one final time
before we say, “Au revoir”. The games may be all virtual,
but the wine is real. It's a good thing too, but I'd hate to have it spilled
every time someone fired a shot. On that note, please raise your glasses,
mes amis, and let us all drink to one another's health.
A votre santé Bon appétit!

Marcel Gagné is an award-winning writer living in Mississauga,
Ontario. He is the author of the all-new Moving to Ubuntu
Linux,
his fifth book from Addison-Wesley. He also makes regular television
appearances as Call for Help's Linux guy. Marcel is also a pilot, a
past Top-40 disc jockey, writes science fiction and fantasy, and folds a
mean Origami T-Rex. He can be reached via e-mail at
mggagne@salmar.com.
You can discover lots of other things (including great Wine links)
from his Web site at www.marcelgagne.com.

Comments

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You see, what you may not know is that your system keeps track of the contents of those virtual consoles (1-6) in a special device file, /dev/sdaX
Just a little slip but /dev/sdaX refers to a scsi drive not the virtual console /dev/vcs1 mentioned previously in the article.

Well, Sacré Bleu! I knew what I was typing before hand but another device file snuck in there accidentally. You are absolutely correct to point it out. That should have been /dev/vcsX for the virtual console device. And I thought it was such a cool trick, too . . . [ insert appropriate smiley here ].

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